D8: 白沙 → 昌江

January 17, 2025

I think this may have been the start of the dodgy stomach that took me down on Sunday.

Having left at a not too unreasonable time, I was walking through one of the bulk snack shops that have been popping up all over China¹ when my stomach started gurgling so bad that I had to leave my basket at the counter while I ran two doors down to a clinic of some kind that had a lobby with a public toilet.

Particularly as the road snack just before the previous day's highest pass had come very close to the end of my day, I hadn't ended up going out for more food. So, I thought it was just me responding poorly to the substantial amount of fiber found in freeze dried vegetable snacks.

Now, and especially when looking at the patterns of stomach upset, I think the more likely culprit is the number of hours the yogurt went unrefrigerated combined with the handful of days since I last had dairy².

Coming back to the shop about a kilo lighter than I was when I ran out, a roadie in clipless pedals was walking around grabbing his own road snacks. Local to Baisha, now that the Rainforest Road is open, this is the first time he's brought his bike with him when coming home for the holidays.

He graciously offered me a minu Snickers, and to even ride with me. At least until he realized that his carbon fiber dream bike plus carefully chosen supplies for the day weigh less than my rear panniers.

We hadn't even made it to the town limits by the time he was so far ahead of me I couldn't see him.

I don't remember how much of the first big climb from Baisha I walked two years ago. I know I was proud of how long I managed before walking but I can't be sure. I was still in a pretty bad headspace over being ghosted³ by Presumably Not Dead Friend⁴, and the only records of that year's ride are short videos.

Last year, I excused my need to walk with the fact that the bike I was riding wasn't meant for luggage and I couldn't gear far enough down.

This year, all forward motion involved pedaling and I didn't even bother using the granny gear⁵.

In the never ending war between Chinese road builders and old trees

I still stopped a lot. But I stopped a lot because I wanted to rather than because I needed to.

With the impeccable timing of a police officer showing up at my hotel room to look at my passport the minute I turn the shower on⁶, as soon as I had decided I'd spent enough time enjoying the scenic overlook about 500m before the pass, the Media Center wanted to talk to me about what sorts of shots I should take in order to do a two or three minute long promo about why Hainan is awesome for cycling.

I may drop the link here later but the guy doing the motorcycle holiday video has like three Insta 360s, and a drone, and—whereas I get my followers from "why does she know more about my hometown than I do?"—got all his followers from Gorgeous Long-form Travel Videos. So, even with one of the professional editors telling me what shots to try to get, it's probably going to look like shit.

Hainan National Tropical Rainforest Park

Entering the habitat of the Hainan Gibbon⁷

As with the Great Wall Scenic Road that kept showing up on last year's Big Ride or the Coastal Tourism Highway that was periodically featured last week, the Rainforest Road is not a single road around the outside of the Rainforest National Park. Instead—although widening, regrading, and new paving have definitely happened in a lot of places—its a collection of roads that have been jointly renamed (but mostly not renumbered) and signposted.

Former farm tracks are now glorious things with wide shoulders and grippy compounds on the long descents. But, there are still places, like the first climb out of Baisha, which are only not the truck route because Hainan doesn't charge tolls to use the expressway⁸.

So, I may be on the Rainforest Road already, but it won't be until I've gone a good two or three hours that I actually experience anything even the slightest bit different from any of the previous times I've gone over this road.

And then, although it's still a good twenty kilometers before I get to the bit that was last year's "oh look, construction, again," oh my WOW is it niiiiiice.

Not just nice, mind you. Niiiiiice.

The hotel that was bookmarked for Changjiang is definitively not the place I stayed last year but, over dinner, I'm able to puzzle through my memories, look at maps, find something that matches, look at the photos, and book the correct place.

Having asked for and gotten the second floor instead of the third, I won't be happy about the warning BEEP that his lobby's emergency lights make once every 45 seconds to insist that their battery really needs changing like yesterday, but it's dirt cheap, impeccably clean, and owned by a guy who has stories about bike touring Hainan in the 80s.

My jpeg to fool the online registration system into working is still on his desktop

¹ Not the Jay Zhou one because the shops that got him as a spokesperson have both individually packaged servings of instant oatmeal that hasn't had fats and sugars and flavors added and they also have milk powder in packets†. Maybe Yummy Market or Happy Tongue Fun?

† that honestly are still really too much for an oatmeal that has anything else added, but which are still better than a giant spillable bag

² I am very mildly lactose intolerant, to the extent that my natural lactase production only starts going down when I've been going without dairy

You can't tell in this picture, but this Scenic Overlook pavilion has traditional architecture from the wrong part of China

³ By this point his disappearance had been reported to the police, who had been able to use his unusual name to look up his ID number and tell me he had recently flown and was definitely alive.

⁴ After asking me to "send him lots of trip photos" on the first morning of my Tour, he stopped responding to me. And never started again. While possibly† being in the cardiac ward with Covid related complications.

† Assuming he was telling me the truth

⁵ Three issues I need to talk about with my bike shop when I get back are the difficulty of shifting into my granny, the not quite right alignment if I use the big ring up front, and that my Rohloff currently seems to only have 12 clicks for a total of 13 gears.

⁶ I kept notes in 2020 and 2021. If the police or Epidemic Prevention and Control ever came to my room, no matter how much time elapsed after my entering the room, two out of three visits happened as soon as I got naked and turned the shower on

⁷ The world's most endangered primate

⁸ A pilot program when I arrived on the island over 20 years ago, the closest other provinces have gotten to adopting "higher taxes on fuel, no charge to use the roads" is by removing most toll booths from most surface roads and bridges

Today's ride: 66 km (41 miles)
Total: 478 km (297 miles)

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